Leno weave elastic fabric



Oct. 26, 1965 R. E. BELLMORE 3,213,893

LENO WEAVE ELASTIC FABRIC Filed March 4, 1964 FIG.|

INVENTOR RAYMOND E. BELLMORE BY It r f4 ATTORNEY United States Patent Ofiice 3,213,893 Patented Oct. 26, 19 65 3,213,893 LENO WEAVE ELASTIC FABRIC Raymond E. Bellmore, West Springfield, Mass, assignor to United Elastic Corporation, Easthampton, Mass., a corporation of Massachusetts Filed Mar. 4, 1964, Ser. No. 349,250 8 Claims. (Cl. 139-419) This invention rel-ates to an improved webbing or other fabric and particularly an elastic fabric.

Elastic webbing or fabric has been used for a number of purposes, for example, elastic bands for mens or womens hosiery, elastic edges for mens shorts, womens panties and the like, edges for strapless brassieres or narrow webbings for brassiere straps and similar purposes. Ordinarily the webbing is made with warp threads part or all of which are covered elastic such as covered rubber, spandex and the like. Usually the weft threads are of textile thread except in certain instances where two way stretch is desired in which case they may also be of covered elastic.

One problem has been encountered, namely slipping on the wearers skin. There is considerable pull, for example on womens and mens hosiery and this can cause webbing at the top to slip. In a similar manner, shorts may slip and the problem is quite severe with strapless brassieres. Even for the elastic straps of brassieres there is still a prob- =lem to keep the strap from slipping off the wearers shoulder.

Edges of uncovered rubber or other elastic thread especially when square present good adhesion or high friction coefficient on the human skin. However, if it is attempted to make the elastic inserts of uncovered rubber, the threads tend to line themselves so that only their smooth surfaces contact the skin and in such a case they are quite slippery, in fact they may well be more slippery than the ordinary covered rubber threads of the conventional elastic inserts.

The present invention solves the problem in a very simple manner by weaving on a leno loom a series of square or other edged rubber or elastic threads. These threads appear as warps between covered elastic threads and are woven in a typical leno design which may be a diamond shape, the preferred shape for the present invention, or may be rectangular or any other common shape produceable by leno weaving. The effect of the leno weaving is that the rubber threads appear as an overlay over the normal webbing being locked at the points where they are woven together in the leno loom, or more correctly the portions of the loo-m which have a leno action. This causes the rubber threads to twist and if they are square this presents the relatively sharp edges of the square thread so that the diamond or other leno weave has a high coefficient of friction for the human skin. The degree of twisting is determined by the number of straight covered rubber strands or other warp threads spanned by the rubber ends in forming the leno weave. If only one cord is spanned, there is less twisting than if two cords are spanbed. It is desirable therefore to span a number of cords. Of course there is a limit because if too many cords are spanned there will be too few rubber track ends in the leno weave and therefore for practical purposes it is preferred to span from 2 to 4 cords but the invention is in no sense limited to the exact number of cords which are spanned. In practice this will also be somewhat affected by the size of the cut rubber threads.

Cut rubber thread or rubber thread with other sharp edges is the preferred form of uncovered elastic for the present invention. It should be understood, however, that any other elastic threads such as those of spandex may be used provided that they have the same relatively sharp edges. In order to avoid confusion the remainder of the specification will describe the preferred modification using cut rubber thread.

The present invention effects a marked economy in the number of square rubber threads used because of the great increase in friction coefiicient by the twisting resulting from the leno weave. Also this weave is relatively light and forms quite a pleasing design. This latter fact-or is of course less significant when the garment is being worm because the leno weave is on the side next to the'wearers skin. The fact that there are no twisted rubber threads on the reverse side of the fabric, which merely catches the leno woven threads at widely separated points and with out any twisting, has an important additional advantage. While it is desirable and important to increase the coefficient of friction for the wears skin to -a relatively high degree it can be highly undesirable to have too much friction or coefficient on the other side of the webbing because this can tend to move other garments, for example the edge of a slip may be temporarily held up by the webbing at the top of womens hosiery. With the present invention this problem does not arise because the side of the webbing which is away from the wearers skin is substantially as smooth as ordinary standard webbing.

The invention will be described in greater detail in conjunction with the drawings in which:

FIG. 1 is a plan view of a webbing showing the side on which the leno weave appears, and

FIG. 2 is -a similar plan view of the other side of the webbing.

The webbing is formed of the conventional covered elastic warp threads 1 textile warp threads 3 and textile rfilling threads 2.

Square cut rubber threads are arranged between each pair of covered rubber threads and are themselves paired. They are shown at 4 in both FIGS. 1 and 2. In FIG. 1 they are shown in a diamond leno weave across the pairs of covered rubber threads 1. This leno weave causes the square threads to be twisted or spiraled exposing their sharp edges.

The net effect as will be seen from FIG. 1 appears as if the diamond :leno weave were on top of the webbing although actually it is locked on the rear side as shown on FIG. 2 at each point where the leno weave locks the square cut rubber threads together. There is thus a good surface of high friction on the side shown in FIG. 1 whereas the other side shown in FIG. 2 substantially as smooth as a standard elastic webbing.

The high degree of friction which is produced by the present invention is effected in a relatively light weave because the rubber threads span .a number of the covered warp threads. At the same time the diamond leno weave forms an attractive design. The diamond weave produces a maximum of friction in all directions but any other form of leno weave such as rectangular or square may be used. However, since the diamond weave is both simple and presents most uniformly a high friction surface it is preferred.

The most important form of fabric on which the present invent-ion may be used is an elastic fabric, that is to say a fabric in which part or all of the warp threads are elastic. However, the advantages of the relative high coefficient of friction on the human skin apply equally to a nonelastic fabric in which the Warp threads are all ordinary textile threads. Such fabrics are sometimes useful for straps of womens underwear where it is not necessary that the fabric be able to stretch. Therefore, in its broader aspects the invention is not limited to an elastic fabric which, however, is the preferred modification.

In the specification and claims the term square cut is used in its practical meaning in the art, namely a cut thread with fairly sharp corners. In practice it is normally attempted to cut to an approximate square shape.

It is impractical to cut an absolutely perfect square shape consistently. Other shapes with edges such as fluted threads perform the same function as square cut threads and are included in the invention.

1 claim:

1. A fabric having one side with a high degree of friction from the human skin comprising in combination a fabric including textile warp threads interspersed with uncovered elastic threads having edges, the warp threads being woven with normal weft thread weave and each of the edged elastic threads being woven in a leno weave spanning a plurality of warp threads whereby the edged elastic threads are twisted and their edges produce a weave of increased coefficient of friction.

2. A fabric according to claim 1 in which the warp threads include both textile warp threads and covered elastic warp threads.

3. A fabric according to claim 2 in which the uncovered elastic threads in the leno weave span from 2 to 4 covered elastic warp threads.

4. A fabric according to claim 1 in which the uncovered elastic threads are square cut rubber threads.

5. A fabric according to claim 2 in which the uncovered elastic threads are square cut rubber threads.

6. A fabric according to claim 4 in which the uncovered elastic threads are square cut rubber threads.

7. A fabric according to claim 1 in which the leno weave is a diamond leno weave.

8. -A fabric according to claim 3 in which the leno weave is a diamond leno weave.

References Cited by the Examiner UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,666,686 4/28 Chisholm 139+421 X 1,707,956 4/29 Moore 139423 1,961,961 6/34 Ooldwell 1'39-421 1,990,836 2/35 Moore l39-419 2,638,130 5/53 'Posson 139421 2,646,828 7/5-3 Hesse 139421 2,682,283 6/54 Lilley 139421 2,835,279 5/58 Horowitz 13042l DONALD W. PARKER, Primary Examiner. 

1. A FABRIC HAVING ONE SIDE WHEN A HIGH DEGREE OF FRICTION FROM THE HUMAN SKIN COMPRISING IN COMBINATION A FABRIC INCLUDING TEXTILE WARP THREADS INTERSPERSED WITH UNCOVERED ELASTIC THREADS HAVING EDGES, THE WARP THREADS BEING WOVEN WITH NORMAL WEFT THREAD WEAVE AND EACH OF THE EDGED ELASTIC THREADS BEING WOBEN IN A LENO WEAVE SPANNING A PLURALITY OF WARP THREADS WHEREBY THE EDGED ELASTIC THREADS ARE TWISTED AND THEIR EDGES PRODUCE A WEAVE OF INCREASED COEFFICEINT OF FRICTION. 